The Open Championship

Where True Character(s) Emerged...

Ryan Fox wins The Open! I can’t say if this sounds more surprising than “Aaron Rai wins The PGA Championship”. What I can say however is like Aaron, Foxy truly is one of the good guys in golf. A tremendous example of a sportsman who just gets on with it, in every way. Of course you could say coming from such great sporting stock that this was somewhat inevitable given his father’s success on a rugby pitch. Where you can most definitely ascertain the genes have passed on though is in the behavioural aspects and demeanour of Foxy’s play. A panacea to modern day sport where we so often find players whining and bitching, or rolling around on football pitches acting like they’ve been shot. A real breath of fresh air is Ryan, and an immensely popular winner of the Claret Jug this year.

For much of yesterday’s final round it looked as though nobody was ready to go out and win their first major. With Scottie Scheffler leaving himself too much to do in reality, even after a most fortuitous break on the 17th hole after hitting it somewhere near/on/in the hospitality tent and receiving a free drop, no other challengers had major winning experience to fall back on. And you could tell! Putts began to come up short, bodies were rushing transition and getting good birdie looks proved close to impossible for all of them. Clearly the set up was difficult and the conditions meant that only perfect shots would get you a birdie look from inside 10 feet. But it was the New Zealander who ultimately took it by the scruff of the neck and had his “fuck it” moment, and when that happens in sport it is so enjoyable to witness. It is the moment where we can all collectively acknowledge we’ve witnessed great character, and can revel in the fact that it is in that moment the sport that is shining through most of all, not the nonsense and theatrics that so often mire sport in general these days. It might not serve the younger generations who’d rather watch Bryson or the Bryan Bros on YouTube or some daft halftime show at the World Cup final, but for me and I suspect for much of you too, it was utterly compelling and adrenaline filled sporting drama. As much as I delighted in Foxy holing that putt on the last green, I was slightly gutted we weren’t going to get a playoff as I think that also would’ve thrown up some terrific drama.

I won’t talk golf swing too much in this piece, and yesterday was a great example of how golf swing isn’t the most important aspect of winning a major championship, but, there is one thing I really like about Ryan Fox’s golf swing under pressure, and it’s his swing direction. When you are under intense pressure in golf, you tend to push your swing pattern to its most extreme boundaries. If you are a player who likes to draw the ball, then that draw becomes more pronounced, and conversely if you are a player who likes to fade the ball then you’ll work harder left through the shot creating a bigger fade. In my opinion, creating the correct amount of side spin under pressure requires you to maintain good mechanics for the majority of your play and only succumb to the exaggerated move at the key moment. It’s why feeling tense and nervous from the very first hole means it’s more likely your swing will buckle under pressure earlier into the final round, because you start to work in imperfect mechanics too early in the round for it to ultimately win out over 18 holes at this level. With Ryan’s swing, thanks to his incredible side bend in his downswing, he is able to swing down the target line quite effortlessly. Using the shot trackers from the TV for reference, Ryan’s ball flight didn’t change a great deal throughout yesterday's round. Whereas we saw Sam Burns miss shots both right and left, and although I think Burns is a brilliant player, my observation of him is that he likes to work his body hard left from the top which is a good feel to have, but again, under intense pressure can cause issues as I think we saw yesterday. It’s a really difficult thing to get right and balance to strike, but I think Foxy did a brilliant job yesterday and for that credit should go to him and his coach.

Image from Google. I didn’t implant RYAN FOX in blue FYI, as I assume you know this isn’t Cameron Tringale.

Of course there were other talking points through the week from Royal Birkdale… I guess the place to start is Bryson DeChambeau. As I said on the podcast, to me the evidence was incontrovertible that he had improved his access to the ball with his movements from the very first moment he arrived at his ball to the moment he walked into hit the shot. Irrespective of intent, although I’m not sure how you can remove intent in this instance, the rules were clearly implemented correctly. And the R&A did a good/kind job with their messaging to make sure Bryson wasn’t going to come out of this with the word “cheat(ed)” attached. I’m happy to put this down to negligence, as I personally don’t think Bryson is the type of guy to cheat. It’s a horrible word with devastating connotations obviously and should only be used in circumstances in which it was so brazen for it to be unavoidable to say it. I don’t think this episode was that. Upon some reflection, I’d have to say I agree entirely with Rory’s comments regarding Bryson holding the event hostage. I thought Rory’s comments were once again exceedingly honest and brave considering there’s a good chance he’s going to encounter Bryson many more times in the years ahead. It really was unacceptable for Bryson to leave it so late in making the call to play on Saturday rather than just accepting the decision and moving on. The delays in getting tee times out to the other competitors would’ve been quite an inconvenience to all involved in the event, and so in that way Bryson absolutely held the event hostage. All for what? Content? As Rory stated, this is just another example of the attention addict Bryson is and adding into all of this reports that he and his manager threatened to call Donald Trump and involve him in the situation a la Gianni Infantino, it is as bizarre as it is sad to see how depraved some of these have become. Fairly depressing in all honesty.

What wasn’t depressing was seeing Tommy Fleetwood glisten at Royal Birkdale. Fairway Jesus might just be the best thing in golf at the moment. As illustrated above, both his attire and his attitude continue to shine and although I am certain he will be disappointed not to have contended deeper into the final round, he should be unbelievably proud of his performance. That’s a lot of pressure, and although I think you could accurately depict him as not quite yet showing his best stuff in the truly biggest moments the way Ryan Fox did yesterday, one thing he continues to show us is his immense strength of character. There’s a resilience to Tommy that is probably unmatched in this sport, the kind we have lauded Rory McIlroy for showing. I wondered yesterday when Tommy got to -8, what might have been going through his mind. Part of me thought maybe the best thing to think of was Aaron Rai’s winning performance at Aronimink. Following in someone’s footsteps is easier than leading the way, as evidenced by the two Czech’s who made the women’s Wimbledon final this year. Tommy, from my perspective anyway, was always the first to achieve. He led the way when we were juniors and amateurs and indeed continues to do so from our generation of English golfers both in terms of results and behaviour. I’m not sure what stepping over the line at a major looks like for Tommy, I still have hope he will do it. One thing is for sure though, if Aaron and Foxy can do it, then so can he.

A few other observations from the week;

Sky Coverage; I’ve found golf a bit frustrating over the years to watch and have been critical of the way it’s rolled out, with a distinct lack of analysis maybe being the biggest issue for me. But I have to say I thought Sky’s coverage last week was fantastic. Extremely thorough in every sense of the word, right from the off. You could say overkill to have Open coverage from as early as Monday/Tuesday, but if you’re a golf geek who wants to see it all, then Sky had you covered. Nick Faldo was utilised well, with hole by hole run throughs and I also got the sense he was less dominating in commentary, enabling the others in there with him to get a word in. We forget in the UK how fortunate we are not to have the amount of Ad breaks they have in the US, so I would say that was the gold standard in golf last week from Sky.

Royal Birkdale / The R&A; The golf course looked incredible. I know some players were bemoaning the lack of rough, but you should see the lack of grass in my back garden. The green keeping team will have worked wonders the make sure the course was played in the condition it was. I will say, some of the greens looked a bit ropey to putt on, most notably holes 7 and 15. I think they were both new greens, so that would help explain the inconsistencies there. But all in all you’d have to say the course was perfectly presented and provided a great test for -10 to be the winning score in fine conditions across the week. As for the R&A, to me they are also increasingly the gold standard. From the outside looking in, they seem to have everything covered. They were bold in getting out in front of any potential behaviour issues both from the players and fans and set boundaries which were understood. Mark Darbon strikes me as being both extremely likeable and competent. There isn’t the whiff of stuffiness that I once associated with the R&A when I was growing up, instead they seem to be forward thinking while attempting to maintain the traditions of the game that we all like to see. All very good stuff.

St Andrews 2027; I will be doing the Open Qualifying for that!

Thanks for reading,

Eddie.